This article discusses findings to the question of what makes gaming so engaging, and does it hold potential as an advertising medium.

In March 2015, a futurePROOF survey revealed that 52% of British adults had played games in the last four weeks.

The study used qualitative research to dive deeper into gamers' conscious views and feelings, combining this with implicit biometric techniques during gaming sessions to understand the unconscious physiological reactions to gaming.

Identifying 3 Es of brand integration in games, the research suggests exposure through overlay adverts, embedded brands that improve immersion in-game, and enhanced integration where the brand adds to the gaming experience with branded content or added features.

Games are engaging partly because they are flexible; games can be personal and they can be social; but the important element for brands is to add value to the experience.

A fundamental principle of marketing suggests that optimal marketing effectiveness results from designing and positioning a product specifically to attract a particular targeted market segment. But many companies want their product to appeal to more than one consumer segment at the same time. In this study, the authors investigated whether video-game marketers should leverage different messages for different target segments for the same product. They found that purchase intentions were enhanced when a segment saw its dedicated advertisement after seeing the other segment's advertisements. Further, this enhancement happened not only from internal processes but also because the advertisements interacted.

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Impact of flow on recognition of and attitudes towards in-game brand placements: Brand congruence and placement prominence as moderators

This study investigates the moderating influences of brand congruence and placement prominence on the impact of game-evoked flow on cognitive and affective outcomes for in-game brand placements. View Summary

This study investigates the moderating influences of brand congruence and placement prominence on the impact of game-evoked flow on cognitive and affective outcomes for in-game brand placements. In two studies, the authors demonstrate that experiencing flow while gaming tends to contribute positively to affective outcomes, leading to more positive brand attitudes, but it has no impact on cognitive processing or brand recognition. In particular, brand congruence moderates the impact of flow, leading to more positive brand attitudes and brand recognition. Brand prominence moderates the impact of flow only on brand recognition, not on brand attitudes. These findings offer several implications, limitations and directions for further research.

Is brand-placement effectiveness immune to competitive interference? This study explored that question in the context of entertainment media, specifically children's video games. Results showed that brands placed in a video game were recalled by only a minority of children and that brand choice was significantly influenced even when the placement was not recalled - suggesting that brand placement may influence children's choice without any explicit cognitive processes. The data further demonstrated that the presence of a competing brand placement may have a negative impact on focal-brand choice. When exposed to a competing brand placement, children were less likely to choose the target brand at test than those who had not been exposed. Thus, advertisers need to negotiate for exclusiveness when placing brands in entertainment media. Furthermore, the dissociation between brand recall and brand choice suggests advertisers should use multiple methods to measure brand placement effectiveness.

This paper describes research into value-exchange advertising in video games, finding that 'opt-in' and value-exchange ads created a positive response.

In the past, video game players resisted in-game advertising, but the development of video game platforms and advertising technology mean that new in-game ads are invitational rather than disruptive, and can deliver in-game rewards.

In this research passive tracking and surveys were used to understand in-game behaviour in response to ads and the users' attitudes.

Attitudes towards such ads were found to be positive, with value-exchange ads being more noticeable and memorable than others.

It was also found that 'opt-in', ads placed in the proper flow of the game and immediate rewards produced a more positive response.

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Mobile media technology and popular mobile games in contemporary society

With the advent of smartphones, the global mobile applications market has increased exponentially.

In particular, mobile games have become extremely popular.

As such, this study explores which mobile technologies have been used in mobile games, and their relation to contemporary mobile gamers' download choices.

Apple's App Store chart and Google Play chart were utilized to analyze the common technological and gaming design features of the contemporary mobile games that are most popular with the gamers, and also to examine similarities and differences between the most popular smartphone and tablet computer games.

The results show that popular mobile games maximize players' touch-based enjoyment (i.e., swiping, sliding or drawing).

In addition, the popular mobile games have at least two of the following features: simple rules, social interactions, and the removal of enemies and missions that do not require defeating an enemy to complete.

Mobile games that require careful controls, such as tilting the screen or fast and unpredictable movements, tended to be more downloaded on the iPad than on the iPhone.

In terms of ranking fluctuations, the paid iOS game charts were statistically more stable than the free iOS game charts.

In-game advertising (IGA) may offer an attractive opportunity for advertisers to reach an elusive consumer segment if messaging is managed effectively. View Summary

In-game advertising (IGA) may offer an attractive opportunity for advertisers to reach an elusive consumer segment if messaging is managed effectively. In this study, the authors applied media uses and gratification theory to investigate factors related to gamers' acceptance of advertisements in online games across various platforms. They also investigated the influence of the acceptance of IGA on gamers' word-of-mouth behavior and attitudes toward brands and products featured in online IGA. Using structural equation modeling as a basis for its hypotheses, the study reveals that "informativeness," entertainment, self-brand congruity, privacy concerns, and invasiveness are associated with online gamer attitudes toward IGA. In turn, attitudes toward IGA are related to word-of-mouth intentions.

This paper describes an ethnographic research study conducted for Microsoft's Gaming Division across seven countries, among teens and young adults who play PC and console video games. View Summary

This paper describes an ethnographic research study conducted for Microsoft's Gaming Division across seven countries, among teens and young adults who play PC and console video games. Both the research methodology and the project deliverables relied on the heavy use of video film; not only were in-home interviews were filmed in each country, and respondents were given video cameras and asked to make their own short films to express their feelings about particular topics relevant to PC and video gaming. When all of this was done, respondents were invited to a central location and participated in a 'Consumer Film Festival' - essentially, a focus group where their films were shown among their peers and used as the basis for group discussion.

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Digital Convergence - A new approach using retail audit data

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

Claude Foch, ESOMAR, Conference on Digital Futures, Paris, March 2005

The paper describes an example of a business application created from an existing retail audit panel by combining the data and on a transversal axis, expanding the scope used in traditional retail audit analysis. View Summary

The paper describes an example of a business application created from an existing retail audit panel by combining the data and on a transversal axis, expanding the scope used in traditional retail audit analysis. This multimedia market vision has provided several key directions to follow within the development of the new system architecture established for data collection, process and analysis.